Chapter 1: The Capitalistic Social Order

§ 6 Commodity economy

If we study how economic life is carried on under the capitalist régime,
we see that its primary characteristic is the production of commodities
. 'Well, what is there remarkable about that?' the reader may ask. The
remarkable point is that a commodity is not simply a product, but
something produced for the market.

A product made for the producer himself, made for his own use, is not a
commodity. When a peasant sows rye, gathers in the harvest, threshes it,
mills the grain, and bakes bread for himself, this bread is certainly not
a commodity; it is simply bread. It only becomes a commodity when it is
bought and sold; when, that is to say, it is produced for a buyer, for the
market. Whoever buys it, owns it.

Under the capitalist system, all products are produced for the market,
they all become commodities. Every factory or workshop produces in
ordinary circumstances one particular product only, and it is easy to
understand that the producer is not producing for his own use. When an
undertaker, in his workshop, has coffins made, it is perfectly clear that
he does not produce these coffins for himself and his family, but for the
market. Again, in the case of a castor oil manufacturer, it is equally
clear that even if the man continually suffers from digestive disorder it
will be impossible for him to use for his own purposes more than an
infinitesimal proportion of all the castor oil which his factory turns
out. The same considerations apply, under capitalism, to any products you
like to consider.

In a button factory, buttons are made; but these millions of buttons are
not produced in order that they may be sewn on to the manufacturer's
waistcoat; they are for sale. Everything produced under the capitalist
system is produced for the market. To this market come gloves and
sausages; books and blacking; machines and whisky; bread, boots, and
small-arms - in a word, everything that is made.

A commodity economy necessarily implies private ownership. The
independent artisan who produces commodities owns his workshop and his
tools; the factory owner or workshop owner owns the factory or the
workshop, with all the buildings, machinery, etc. Now, wherever private
ownership and commodity production exist, there is a struggle for buyers,
or competition among sellers. Even in the days before there were factory
owners, workshop owners, and great capitalists, when there were only
independent artisans, these artisans struggled one with another for
buyers. The strongest and most acquisitive among them, the one who had the
best tools and was the cleverest, especially the one who put by money, was
always the one who came to the top, attracted custom, and ruined his
rivals. Thus the system of petty ownership and the commodity economy that
was based upon it, contained the germs of large-scale ownership and
implied the ruin of many.

WE SEE, THEREFORE, THAT THE PRIMARY CHARACTERISTIC OF THE CAPITALIST
SYSTEM IS A COMMODITY ECONOMY; THAT IS, AN ECONOMY WHICH PRODUCES FOR THE
MARKET.

§ 7 Monopolization of the means of production by the capitalist
class

The mere existence of a commodity economy does not alone suffice to
constitute capitalism. A commodity economy can exist although there are no
capitalists; for instance, the economy in which the only producers are
independent artisans. They produce for the market, they sell their
products; thus these products are undoubtedly commodities, and the whole
production is commodity production. Nevertheless, this is not capitalist
production; it is nothing more than simple commodity production.
In order that a simple commodity economy can be transformed into
capitalist production, it is necessary, on the one hand, that the means of
production (tools, machinery, buildings, land, etc.) should become the
private property of a comparatively limited class of wealthy capitalists;
and, on the other, that there should ensue the ruin of most of the
independent artisans and peasants and their conversion into wage workers.

We have already seen that a simple commodity economy contains within
itself the germs that will lead to the impoverishment of some and the
enrichment of others. This is what has actually occurred. In all countries
alike, most of the independent artisans and small masters have been
ruined. The poorest were forced in the end to sell their tools; from
'masters' they became 'men' whose sole possession was a pair of hands.
Those on the other hand who were richer, grew more wealthy still; they
rebuilt their workshops on a more extensive scale, installed new
machinery, began to employ more workpeople, became factory owners.

Little by little there passed into the hands of these wealthy persons
all that was necessary for production: factory buildings, machinery, raw
materials, warehouses and shops, dwelling houses, workshops, mines,
railways, steamships, the land - in a word, all the means of production.
All these means of production became the exclusive property of the
capitalist class; they became, as the phrase runs, a 'monopoly' of the
capitalist class.

THE SMALL GROUP OF THE WEALTHY OWNS EVERYTHING; THE HUGE MASSES OF THE
POOR OWN NOTHING BUT THE HANDS WITH WHICH THEY WORK. THIS MONOPOLY OF THE
MEANS OF PRODUCTION BY THE CAPITALIST CLASS IS THE SECOND LEADING
CHARACTERISTIC OF THE CAPITALIST SYSTEM.

§ 8 Wage Labour

The vast numbers who were left without any property were transformed
into the wage labourers of capital. What indeed was left for the
impoverished peasant or artisan to do? Either take service as agricultural
labourer under the capitalist landowner, or else go to the town and there
seek employment in factory or workshop. There was no other way out. Such
was the origin of wage labour, the third characteristic of the capitalist
system.

What is wage labour? In earlier days, when there were serfs or slaves,
every serf or slave could be bought and sold. Persons with skin, hair,
arms, and legs were the private property of their lord. The lord would
flog one of his serfs to death in the stable as lightly as, in a drunken
fit, he would break a stool or a chair. The serf or slave was merely a
chattel. Among the ancient Romans, a master's property, all that was
necessary for production, was classified as 'dumb tools' (things),
'half-speaking tools' (beasts of burden, sheep, cows, oxen, etc. -
in a word, inarticulate animals), and 'speaking tools' (slaves,
human beings). A spade, an ox, a slave, were for the master all alike tools
or utensils, which he could buy, sell, misuse, or destroy, at
pleasure.

The wage labourer can be neither bought nor sold. What can be bought and
sold is his labour power; not the man or woman, but the capacity
for labour. The wage labourer is personally free; the factory owner cannot
flog him in the stable, or sell him to a neighbour, or exchange him for a
wolf-hound puppy, though all these things could be done when serfdom
prevailed. The wage worker can merely be hired. To all appearance the
capitalist and the wage worker are equals. 'Don't work if you don't want
to; there is no compulsion,' says the factory owner. The employer actually
declares that he feeds the worker, gives work to the employee.

As a matter of fact, however, the conditions are far from being the same
for wage earner and capitalist. The workers are enchained by hunger.
Hunger compels them to hire themselves out, that is, to sell their labour
power. There is no other solution for the worker; he has no choice. With
his hands alone he cannot produce 'his' product. Just try without tools
and machinery to found steel, to weave, to build railway carriages. Under
capitalism, the very land is all in private hands; there remains no spot
unowned where an enterprise can be carried on. The freedom of the worker
to sell his labour power, the freedom of the capitalist to buy it, the
'equality' of the capitalist and the wage earner - all these are but
hunger's chain which compels the labourer to work for the capitalist.

In this manner, the essence of wage labour consists in the sale of
labour power, or in the transformation of labour power into a commodity.
In the simple commodity economy which was described in §6,
there were to be found in the market: milk, bread, cloth, boots, etc.; but
not labour power. Labour power was not for sale. Its possessor, the
independent artisan, had in addition his own little dwelling and his
tools. He worked for himself, conducted his own enterprise, applied his
own labour power to the carrying of it on.

Very different is it under capitalism. The worker no longer owns the
means of production; he cannot make use of his labour power for the
conduct of his own enterprise; if he would save himself from starvation,
he must sell his labour power to the capitalist. Side by side with the
markets where cotton, cheese, and machines are sold, there also comes into
existence the labour market where proletarians, that is to say
wage workers, sell their labour power.

WE SEE, THEN, THAT THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN THE CAPITALIST ECONOMY AND THE
SIMPLE COMMODITY ECONOMY CONSISTS IN THIS, THAT IN THE CAPITALIST ECONOMY
LABOUR POWER ITSELF BECOMES A COMMODITY. THUS, THE THIRD CHARACTERISTIC OF
THE CAPITALIST SYSTEM IS THE EXISTENCE OF WAGE LABOUR.

§ 9 Contradictions of production under capitalism

There are, therefore, three characteristics of the capitalist system,
namely: production for the market (commodity production); the
monopolization of the means of production by the capitalist class; wage
labour, that is, labour founded upon the sale of labour power.

All these characteristics are associated with the question, What are the
mutual relationships between the individuals engaged in production and
distribution? When we say 'commodity production' or 'production for the
market', what does the phrase mean? It means that individuals work for one
another, but that each produces for the market in his own enterprise, not
knowing beforehand who will buy his wares. Let us suppose that there are
an artisan named John and a peasant named George. John the artisan, a
bootmaker, takes boots to the market and sells them to George, and with
the money which George pays for them he buys bread from George. When John
went to the market he did not know that he would meet George there, nor
did George know that he would meet John; both men simply went to the
market. When John bought the bread and George bought the boots, the result
was that George had been working for John and John had been working for
George, although the fact was not immediately obvious. The turmoil of the
market place conceals from people that in actual fact they work for one
another and cannot live without one another. In a commodity economy,
people work for one another, but they do so in an unorganized manner and
independently of each other, not knowing how necessary they are to one
another. Consequently, in commodity production, individuals stand in
definite relationships one to another, and what we are here concerned with
is these mutual relationships.

In like manner, when we speak of 'the monopolization of the means of
production' or of 'wage labour', we are really talking about the
relationships between individuals. What, in fact, does 'monopolization'
signify? It signifies that persons work under such conditions that those
who labour do so with means of production belonging to others; it
signifies that the workers are subordinated to the owners of these means
of production, namely to the capitalists. In a word, here also we are
concerned with the question, What are the mutual relationships between
individuals when they produce goods? The mutual relationships between
individuals during the process of production are termed the
relationships of production.

It is easy to see that the relationships of production have not always
been the same. Very long ago, when people lived in small communities, they
worked together in comradely fashion (hunting, fishing, gathering fruit
and roots), and they divided everything among themselves. Here we have one
kind of relationships of production. In the days of slavery, the
relationships of production were of another kind. Under capitalism there
is a third kind of relationship. There are, therefore, various kinds of
relationships of production. We speak of these kinds of relationships of
production as the economic systems (types) of society or as the
methods of production.

'CAPITALIST RELATIONSHIPS OF PRODUCTION', OR IN OTHERS WORDS 'A
CAPITALIST TYPE OF SOCIETY', OR 'THE CAPITALIST METHOD OF PRODUCTION'THESE
TERMS EXPRESS THE RELATIONSHIPS BETWEEN INDIVIDUALS IN A COMMODITY ECONOMY
CHARACTERIZED BY THE MONOPOLY OWNERSHIP OF THE MEANS OF PRODUCTION ON THE
PART OF A SMALL GROUP OF CAPITALISTS, AND CHARACTERIZED BY WAGE LABOUR ON
THE PART OF THE WORKING CLASS.

§ 10 The exploitation of labour power

The question now arises, for what reason does the capitalist class hire
workers? Everyone knows that the reason is by no means because the factory
owners wish to feed the hungry workers, but because they wish to
extract profit from them. For the sake of profit, the factory owner
builds his factory; for the sake of profit, he engages workers; for the
sake of profit, he is always nosing out where higher prices are paid.
Profit is the motive of all his calculations. Herein, moreover, we discern
a very interesting characteristic of capitalist society. For society does
not itself produce the things which are necessary and useful to it;
instead of this, the capitalist class compels the workers to produce those
things for which more will be paid, those things from which the
capitalists derive the largest profit. Whisky, for example, is a very
harmful substance, and alcoholic liquors in general ought to be produced
;only for technical purposes and for their use in medicine. But throughout
the world the capitalists produce alcohol with all their might. Why?
Because to ply the people with drink is extremely profitable.

We must now make it perfectly clear, how profit is made. For this
purpose we must examine the question in detail. The capitalist receives
profit in the form of money when he sells commodities that have been
produced in his factory. How much money does he get for his wares? That
depends upon the price. The next question is, How is the price determined,
or why does one commodity fetch a high price and another a low price? It
is easy to understand that if, in any branch of production, new machinery
is introduced and labour is advantageously applied (or, as the phrase
goes, is very productive), then the price of the commodity falls. If, on
the other hand, production is difficult, if the quantity of goods produced
is small, if labour is unsuccessfully applied or is comparatively
unproductive, then the price of the commodity rises.1)

If society must expend on the average much labour in order to produce
any article, the price of that article is high; if on the average little
labour is required, the price of the article is low. Assuming average
efficiency of manufacture (that is to say, when the machinery and tools
employed are neither the very best nor the very worst), the amount of
social labour requisite for the production of a commodity is termed the
value of that commodity. We see that price depends upon value. In
actual fact, price is sometimes higher than value and sometimes lower, but
for simplicity we may here assume that they are one and the same.

We must now recall what we said concerning the hiring of wage workers.
The hiring of a worker is the sale of a peculiar commodity, the name of
which is 'labour power'. As soon as labour power has become a commodity,
what applies to other commodities applies to labour power. When the
capitalist hires the worker, the former pays the latter the price of his
labour power (or, to speak simply, the value of his labour power). By what
is this value determined? We have seen that the value of all commodities
is determined by the quantity of labour expended in producing them. The
same thing applies to labour power.

What, however, do we mean by the production of labour power? Labour
power is not indeed produced in a factory, like cloth, blacking, or
machinery. How then are we to explain it? We have merely to look at
contemporary life under capitalism in order to understand with what we are
concerned. Let us suppose that the workers have just finished their day's
work. They are tired out, all their vital energy has been used up, they
cannot work any more. Their labour power is practically exhausted. What is
needed to restore it? Food, rest, sleep, recuperation, and therewith
strength will be restored. Then will reappear the capacity for work; then,
once more, they will have labour power. This means that food, clothing,
and shelter - in a word, the necessaries that the worker consumes - affect
the production of his labour power. Additional elements have to be
considered, such as expenditure upon training when skilled workers are
needed, and so on.

Everything that the working class consumes in order to restore its
labour power, has value. For this reason, the value of articles of
consumption and also of expenditure upon training constitute the value of
labour power. Different commodities possess different values. In like
manner, each kind of labour power has its peculiarvalue. The labour power
of the compositor has one value, the labour power of the unskilled
labourer has another.

Let us now return to the factory. The capitalist buys raw materials,
fuel, machinery, lubricants, and other necessaries; then he buys labour
power, 'engages hands'. He pays cash for everything. The work of
production begins. The workers work, the wheels turn, the fuel is burned,
the lubricant is used, the factory buildings suffer wear and tear, the
labour power is expended. As a result, there issues from the factory a new
commodity. The commodity, like all commodities, has value. What is this
value? First of all, the commodity has absorbed into itself the value of
the means of production that have been used up; that which has passed into
it - raw materials, fuel consumed, the worn parts of the machinery, and so
on. All this has now been transformed into the value of the commodity. In
the second place, there has passed into the commodity the labour of the
workers. If the workers were 30 in number, and if in the production of the
commodity each worked for 30 hours, then there will have been expended in
all goo working hours. The full value of the product will therefore
consist of the value of the utilized materials (let us assume that the
value of these is equivalent to Goo hours), together with the new value
which the workers have added by their labour, namely goo hours. The total
is therefore 600+900=1500 working hours.

But how much did the commodity cost the capitalist? For the raw
materials he paid in full; that is to say, he paid a sum of money
corresponding to the value of boo working hours. But what did he pay for
labour power? Did he pay for the whole goo hours? Here lies the key to the
riddle. By our hypothesis, he has paid the full value of the labour power
for the working days. If 30 workers have worked 30 hours, three days for
10 hours a day, the factory owner will have paid them whatever sum was
necessary for the recuperation of their labour power during these days.
How much will this sum have been? The answer is plain; it will have been
considerably less than goo. Why? Because the quantity of labour which is
necessary to recuperate my labour power is one thing, whereas the quantity
of labour which I am able to expend is another thing. I can work 10 hours
a day. To provide a sufficiency of food, clothing, etc., my daily needs
are a quantity of articles the total value of which is equal to 5 hours.
That is to say, I can do more work than the work which is requisite to
recuperate my labour power. In our example, the workers consume, let us
say, in the form of food, clothing, etc., during the three days, articles
to the value of 4.50 working hours; but they supply goo hours of labour.
There remain for the capitalist 450 hours; these form the source of his
profit. In fact, the commodity has cost the capitalist, as we have seen,
600+450=1050 hours; but he sells it for the value of 600+900=1500 hours;
450 hours are surplus value created by labour power. It results
that for half their working time (namely for 5 hours in a ten-hour working
day) the workers are working to redintegrate what they have used up for
themselves; but during the other half of the day they are working entirely
for the capitalist.

Let us now consider society as a whole. What the individual factory
owner or the individual worker does is of very little interest to us. What
interests us is the structure of the huge machine which goes by the name
of capitalist society. The capitalist class hires the working class, the
latter being numerically of enormous size. In millions of factories, in
mines and quarries, in forest and field, hundreds of millions of workers
labour like ants. Capital pays them their wages, the value of their labour
power, with which they unceasingly renew this labour power for the service
of capital. By its labour, the working class does not merely pay its own
wages, but it creates in addition the income of the upper classes, creates
surplus value. Through a thousand runnels, this surplus value flows into
the pockets of the master class. Part goes to the capitalist himself, in
the form of entrepreneur's profit; part goes to the landowner; in the form
of taxes, part enters the coffers of the capitalist State; other portions
accrue to merchants, traders, and shopkeepers, are spent upon churches and
in brothels, support actors, artists, bourgeois scribblers, and so on.
Upon surplus value live all the parasites who are bred by the capitalist
system.

Part of the surplus value is, however, used over again by the
capitalists. They add it to their capital, and the capital grows. They
extend their enterprises. They engage more workers. They instal better
machinery. The increased number of workers produces for them a still
greater quality of surplus value. The capitalist enterprises grow ever
larger. Thus at each revolution of time, capital moves forward, heaping up
surplus value. Squeezing surplus value out of the working class, exploiting
the workers, capital continually increases in size.

§ 11 Capital

We now see clearly what capital is. Before all else, it is a definite
value: it may be in the form of money; it may be in the form of machinery,
raw materials, or factory buildings; it may be in the form of finished
commodities. But it is value of such a kind as serves for the production
of new value, for the production of surplus value. WHICH PRODUCES SURPLUS
VALUE. CAPITALIST PRODUCTION IS THE PRODUCTION OF SURPLUS VALUE.

In capitalist society, machinery and factory buildings take the form of
capital. But do machinery and buildings always take the form of capital?
Certainly not. If the whole of society were a cooperative commonwealth
producing everything for itself, then neither machinery nor raw materials
would be capital, seeing that they would not be means for the creation of
profit for a small group of rich persons. That is to say, machinery, for
example, only becomes capital when it is the private property of the
capitalist class, when it serves the purpose .of exploiting wage labour,
when it serves to produce surplus value. The form of the value is
here unimportant. The value may be in the form of gold coins or paper
money, with which the capitalist buys the means of production and labour
power. It may be in the form of the machines with which the workers work;
or of the raw materials out of which they make commodities; or of the
finished articles which will subsequently be sold. If, however, this value
serves for the production of surplus value, it is capital.

As a rule capital is continually assuming new aspects. Let us study how
these transformations take place.

I. The capitalist has not yet bought labour power or the means of
production. He is, however, eager to engage workers, to procure machinery,
to obtain raw materials of the best quality, to get a sufficient supply of
coal, and so on. As yet, he has nothing except money. Here we have capital
in its monetary form.

II. With this supply of money the capitalist makes his way to the market
- not of course in his own person, since he has the telephone, the
telegraph, and a hundred servants. Here takes place the purchase of the
means of production and of labour power. The capitalist returns to the
factory without money, but with workers, machinery, raw materials, and
fuel. These things are now no longer commodities. They have ceased to be
commodities; they are not for sale. The money has been transformed into
means of production and into labour power. The monetary wrapping has been
cast aside; the capital has assumed the form of industrial capital.

Now the work begins. The machinery is set in motion, the wheels turn,
the levers move to and fro, the workers drip with sweat, the machinery
undergoes wear and tear, the raw materials are used up, the labour power
is tired out.

III. Thereupon, all the raw material, the wear and tear of the machines,
the labour power, undergo a gradual transformation into masses of
commodities. Thus the capital assumes a new guise; its factory embodiment
vanishes, and it takes the form of quantities of commodities. We have
capital in its commodity form. But now, when production is
completed, the capital has not merely changed its wrapping. It has
increased in value, for in the course of production there has been added
to it surplus value.

IV. In production, the aim of the capitalist is not to provide goods for
his own use, but to produce commodities for the market, for sale. That
which was stored up in his warehouse, must be sold. At first the
capitalist went to market as a buyer. Now he has to go there as a seller.
At first he had money in his hands, and he wanted to buy commodities (the
means of production). Now he has commodities in his hands, and he wants to
get money. When these commodities are sold, capital jumps back from its
commodity form into its monetary form. But the quantity of money which the
capitalist receives differs from the quantity which he originally paid
out, inasmuch as it is greater by the whole amount of the surplus
value.

This, however, does not end the movement of capital. The enlarged
capital is set in motion once again, and acquires a still larger quantity
of surplus value. This surplus value is in part added to capital, and
begins a new cycle. Capital rolls on like a snowball, and at each
revolution there adheres to it a larger quantity of surplus value. The
result of this is that capitalist production continually expands.

Thus capital sucks surplus value out of the working class and everywhere
extends its dominion. Its peculiarities account for its rapid growth. The
exploitation of one class by another took place in earlier days. Let us
consider, for example, a landowner when serfdom prevailed, or a
slave-owner in classical antiquity. They lived on the backs of their serfs
and slaves. But all which the workers produced, the landowners and
slaveowners ate, drank, and wore - either themselves, or else their
servants and their numerous hangers-on. At that time there was very little
commodity production. There was no market. If the landowner or slaveowner
had compelled his serfs or slaves to produce vast quantities of bread,
meat, fish, etc., all this would simply have rotted. Production was
restricted to the gratification of the animal needs of the landowner and
his household. It is very different under capitalism. Here production
takes place, not for the gratification of immediate needs, but for profit.
Under capitalism, the commodity is produced for sale, for the sake of
gain, in order that profits may be heaped up. The larger the profit, the
better. Hence the mad hunt for profit on the part of the capitalist class.
This greed knows no limits. It is the pivot, the prime motive, of
capitalist production.

§ 12 The capitalist state

As we have seen, capitalist society is based upon the exploitation of
labour. A small minority owns everything; the working masses own nothing.
The capitalists command. The workers obey. The capitalists exploit. The
workers are exploited. The very essence of capitalist society is found in
this merciless and ever-increasing exploitation.

Capitalist production is a practical instrument for the extraction of
surplus value.

Why has this instrument been able to continue in operation so long? For
what reason do the workers tolerate such a state of affairs?

This question is by no means easy to answer at first sight. Speaking
generally there are two reasons for it: in the first place, because the
capitalist class is well organized and powerful; secondly, because the
bourgeoisie frequently controls the brains of the working class.

The most trustworthy means at the disposal of the bourgeoisie for this
purpose is its organization as the State. In all capitalist countries the
State is merely a union of the master class. Let us consider any country
you like: Britain, the United States, France, or Japan. Everywhere we find
that the ministers, high officials, members of parliament, are either
capitalists, landowners, factory owners, and financial magnates, or else
the faithful and well-paid servants of these-lawyers, bank managers,
professors, army officers, archbishops, and bishops, who serve the
capitalists, not from fear but from conviction.

The union of all these individuals belonging to the bourgeoisie, a union
which embraces the entire country and holds everything in its grasp, is
known as the State. This organization of the bourgeoisie has two leading
aims. The first and most important of these is to suppress disorders and
insurrections on the part of the workers, to ensure the undisturbed
extraction of surplus value from the working class, to increase the
strength of the capitalist means of production. The second aim is to
strive against other organizations of the same kind (that is to say,
against other bourgeois States), to compete with them for a larger share
in surplus value. Thus the capitalist State is a union of the master
class, formed to safeguard exploitation. The interests of capital and
nothing but the interests of capital - here we have the guiding star
towards which are directed all the activities of this robber band.

Against such a view of the bourgeois State, the
following considerations might be adduced.

You say that the State is exclusively run in the
interests of capital. Consider this point, however. In all capitalist
countries there is factory legislation forbidding or restricting child
labour, limiting the working day, and so on. In Germany, for example, in
the days of William II, there prevailed a fairly good system of State
insurance for the workers. In England, the typically bourgeois minister
Lloyd George introduced the Insurance Act and the Old-Age Pensions Act. In
all bourgeois lands, there are hospitals, dispensaries, and sanatoriums
for the workers; railways are constructed, and by these all can travel,
rich and poor alike; waterworks are instituted for the supply of the
towns, and so on. Such things are for the public service. This implies,
many will say, that even in those countries where capital rules, the State
is not run solely in the interests of capital, but is concerned likewise
with the interests of the workers. The State actually punishes factory
owners who infringe factory legislation.

These arguments are fallacious, for the following
reasons. It is perfectly true that the bourgeois authority occasionally
passes laws and regulations useful to the working class. They are,
however, passed in the interest of the bourgeoisie. Let us take as an
example the railways. The workers travel by them, and for this reason they
are useful to the workers. But they are not built for the sake of the
workers. Merchants and factory owners need railways for the carriage of
their wares, for the transport of troops, for the conveyance of workers,
etc. Capital needs railways, and builds them in its own interest. They are
useful to the workers too, but that is not why the capitalist State
constructs them. Again, let us take the cleaning of the towns, or urban
sanitation as it is called, and let us consider the hospitals. In these
cases the bourgeoisie is concerned about the working-class districts as
well as about the others. It is true that, in comparison with the
bourgeois quarters in the centre of the town, we find, in the
working-class suburbs, dirt, the abomination of desolation, disease, etc.
Nevertheless, the bourgeoisie does do something. Why? Because illness and
epidemics sometimes spread all through the town, and if such a thing
should happen the bourgeoisie, too, would suffer. In this matter,
therefore, the bourgeois State and its urban instruments are simply
pursuing bourgeois interests.

Here is another example. During the nineteenth century,
the French workers learned from the bourgeoisie the practice of birth
control. By artificial means they arranged either to have no children at
all or no more than two children. The povertyof theworkers was so great
that to rear a larger family was difficult or almost impossible. As a
result of this practice, the population of France remained nearly
stationary. The French bourgeoisie began to be short of soldiers. A
clamour was raised: 'The nation is perishing! The Germans are increasing
more rapidly than we are! They will have more soldiers!' It may be
remarked in passing that year by year those who were called up for
military service proved less and less fit; they were shorter, had a
smaller chest measurement, were more weakly. And now, behold, the
bourgeoisie grew 'freehanded'; it began to insist upon improved conditions
for the working class, in order that the workers might rear more children.
Undoubtedly, if you kill the hen, you will not get any more eggs.

In all these cases, the bourgeoisie has certainly taken
steps useful to the workers; but it has done so solely in its own
interests. In many instances, however, measures useful to the workers have
been inaugurated by the bourgeois State owing to the pressure of the
working class. Nearly all the factory laws were secured in such a manner,
in consequence of threats on the part of the workers. In England, the
first legal limitation of the working day (to 10 hours) was brought about
by working-class pressure. In Russia, the tsarist government passed the
first factory laws owing to its alarm on account of disorders and strikes
among the workers. In these matters the State, which consists of the
enemies of the working class, the State, which is an economic
organization, reckons up its own interests, saying: 'It is better to
yield a certain amount today than to yield twice as much tomorrow; and it
is better to yield than to risk one's skin.' The factory owner who yields
to the demands of his workers on strike and concedes them an extra
halfpenny, does not cease to be a factory owner; nor does the bourgeois
State in any way lose its bourgeois characteristics when it makes some
small concession owing to working-class pressure.

The capitalist State is not only the largest and most powerful among
bourgeois organizations; it is at the same time the most complex of these
organizations, for it has a very large number of subdivisions, and
tentacles issue from these in every direction. The primary aim of all this
is to protect, to consolidate, and to expand the exploitation of the
working class. Against the working class, the State can employ measures of
two different kinds, brute force and spiritual subjugation. These
constitute the most important instruments of the capitalist State.

Among the organs of brute force, must first be enumerated the
army and the police, the prisons and the law-courts. Next must be
mentioned accessory organs, such as spies, provocative agents, organized
strikebreakers, hired assassins, etc.

The army of the capitalist State is organized in a peculiar
fashion. At the head is the officers' corps, the group of 'epaulet
wearers'. They are drawn from the ranks of the landed gentry, from those
of the wealthier bourgeoisie, and in part from those of the intelligentsia
(professional classes). These are the bitterest enemies of the
proletariat. From childhood they have been brought up in special schools
(in Russia in cadet corps and in junker schools) where they have been
taught how to knock the men about, and how ' to maintain the honour of the
uniform', this meaning to keep the rankers in absolute subjection and to
make mere pawns of them. The most distinguished members of the nobility
and the wealthier bourgeoisie, if they enter the military or naval
profession, become generals or admirals, persons of high rank, wearing
orders and ribbons.

Nor are the officers ever drawn from among the poor. They have the mass
of common soldiers entirely in their hands. These latter are so completely
under the influence of their environment that they never ask what they are
fighting for, but simply keep their ears cocked for orders. Such an army
is primarily intended to hold the workers in check.

In Russia, the tsarist army was repeatedly used
to keep down the workers and peasants. During the reign of Alexander II,
before the liberation of the serfs, there were numerous risings of the
peasantry, and these were all suppressed by the army. In the year 1905,
the army shot down the workers during the Moscow rising; it carried out
punitive expeditions in the Baltic provinces, in the Caucasus, and in
Siberia; in the years 1906-8, it suppressed peasant risings and protected
the property of the landowners. During the war, the army shot down the
workers at Ivanovo-Voznesensk, at Kostroma, and elsewhere. The officers
were especially ruthless. Foreign armies behave in just the same way. In
Germany, the army of the capitalist State has likewise been used
to keep the workers down. The first naval rising was suppressed by the
army. Risings of the workers in Berlin, Hamburg, Munich, all over Germany,
were crushed by the army. In France, the army has frequently shot
down strikers; quite recently it has shot the workers, and also a number
of Russian revolutionary soldiers. In the British Empire, in quite
recent days, the army has frequently crushed risings of the Irish workers,
risings of the Egyptian fellahin, risings in India; in England itself, the
soldiers have attacked great meetings of the workers. In Switzerland,
during every strike, the machine-gun corps is mobilized and the socalled
militia (the Swiss army) is summoned to the colours; so far, however, the
militia has not fired on the proletarians. In the United States,
the army has frequently burned working-class settlements and has razed
houses to the ground (for instance, during the strike in Colorado). The
armies of the capitalist States are today combining to strangle the
workers' revolutions in Russia, Hungary, the Balkans, and Germany; they
are crushing revolts all over the world.

The police and the gendarmerie. In addition to the
regular army, the capitalist State has an army of picked ruffians, and of
specially trained troops, peculiarly adapted for the struggle with the
workers. These institutions (the police, for instance) have, indeed, the
function of combating theft and of 'protecting the persons and property of
citizens'; but at the same time the police are maintained for the arrest,
prosecution, and punishment, of discontented workers. In Russia, the
police have been the most trustworthy protectors of the landlords and the
tsar. Especially brutal, in all capitalist countries, have been the
members of the secret police and of the corps of gendarmes - in Russia the
secret police force or 'political police' was known as the ohrana (protection).
Large numbers of detectives, provocative agents, spies, strikebreakers,
etc., work in cooperation with the official police.

Interesting, in this connexion, are the methods of the
American secret police. They are in league with a vast number of private
and semi-official 'detective bureaux'. The notorious adventures of Nat
Pinkerton were really a campaign against the workers. The detectives
palmed off bombs on the workers' leaders, incited them to kill the
capitalists, and so forth. Such 'detectives' likewise recruit vast numbers
of strikebreakers (known in the United States as 'scabs'), and troops of
armed ruffians who murder strikers when opportunity arises. There is no
villainy too black for these assassins, who are employed by the
'democratic' State of the American capitalists!

The administration of justice in the bourgeois State is a means
of self-defence for the bourgeois class. Above all, it is employed to
settle with those who infringe the rights of capitalist property or
interfere with the capitalist system. Bourgeois justice sent Liebknecht to
prison, but acquitted Liebknecht's murderer. The State prison service
settles accounts quite as effectively as does the executioner of the
bourgeois State. Its shafts are directed, not against the rich, but
against the poor.

Such are the institutions of the capitalist State, institutions which
effect the direct and brutal oppression of the working class.

Among the means of spiritual subjugation at the disposal of the
capitalist State, three deserve especial mention: the State school; the
State church; and the State, or State-supported, press.

The bourgeoisie is well aware that it cannot control the working masses
by the use of force alone. It is necessary that the workers' brains should
be completely enmeshed as if in a spider's web. The bourgeois State looks
upon the workers as working cattle; these beasts must labour, but they
must not bite. Consequently, they must not merely be whipped or shot when
they attempt to bite, but they must be trained and tamed, just as wild
beasts in a menagerie are trained by beast-tamers. Similarly, the
capitalist State maintains specialists to stupefy and subdue the
proletariat; it maintains bourgeois teachers and professors, the clergy,
bourgeois authors and journalists. In the State schools these specialists
teach children from their earliest years to obey capital and to despise
and hate 'rebels'. The children's heads are stuffed with fables about the
revolution and the revolutionary movement. Emperors, kings, and industrial
magnates are glorified. In the churches, the priests, who are salaried by
the State, preach that all authority comes from God. Day after day, the
bourgeois newspapers trumpet these lies, whilst workingclass papers are in
most cases suppressed by the capitalist State. Under such conditions, is
'it easy for the workers to extract themselves from the quagmire? A German
imperialist bandit wrote: ' We do not only need the soldiers' legs, but
also their brains and their hearts.' The bourgeois State, in like manner,
aims at educating the workers so that they may resemble domestic animals
who will work like horses, and eat humble pie.

In this manner the capitalist system ensures its own development. The
machine of exploitation does its work. Surplus value is continually
extracted from the working class. The capitalist State stands on guard,
and takes good care that there shall be no uprising of the wage slaves.

§ 13 Fundamental contraictions of the capitalist system

We must now examine whether capitalist or bourgeois society is well or
ill constructed. Anything is sound and good when the mutual adaptation of
its parts is entirely satisfactory. Let us consider the mechanism of a
clock. It works accurately and freely if all the cog-wheels are properly
adjusted one to another.

Let us now look at capitalist society. We can perceive without
difficulty that capitalist society is far less soundly constructed than it
appears to be at the first glance. On the contrary, it exhibits grave
contradictions and disastrous flaws. In the first place, under capitalism
the production and distribution of goods is quite unorganized; 'anarchy of
production' prevails. What does this mean? It means that all the
capitalist entrepreneurs (or capitalist companies) produce commodities
independently of one another. Instead of society undertaking to reckon up
what it needs and how much of each article, the factory owners simply
produce upon the calculation of what will bring them most profit and will
best enable them to defeat their rivals in the market. The consequence
often is that commodities are produced in excessive quantities - we are
talking, of course, of pre-war days. There is then no sale for them. The
workers cannot buy them, for they have not enough money. Thereupon a
crisis ensues. The factories are shut down, and the workers are turned out
into the street. Furthermore, the anarchy of production entails a struggle
for the market; each producer wants to entice away the others' customers,
to corner the market. This struggle assumes various forms: it begins with
the competition between two factory owners; it ends in the world war,
wherein the capitalist States wrestle with one another for the world
market. This signifies, not merely that the parts of capitalist society
interfere with one another's working, but that there is a direct conflict
between the constituent parts.

THE FIRST REASON, THEREFORE, FOR THE DISHARMONY OF CAPITALIST SOCIETY IS
THE ANARCHY OF PRODUCTION, WHICH LEADS TO CRISES, INTERNECINE COMPETITION,
AND WARS.

THE SECOND REASON FOR THE DISHARMONY OF CAPITALIST SOCIETY IS TO BE
FOUND IN THE CLASS STRUCTURE OF THAT SOCIETY. Considered in its essence,
capitalist society is not one society but two societies; it consists of
capitalists, on the one hand, and of workers and poor peasants, on the
other. Between these two classes there is continuous and irreconcilable
enmity; this is what we speak of as the class war. Here, also, we
see that the various parts of capitalist society are not merely
ill-adapted to one another, but are actually in unceasing conflict.

Is capitalism going to collapse, or is it not? The answer to the
question depends upon the following considerations. If we study the
evolution of capitalism, if we examine the changes it has undergone in the
course of time, and if we perceive that its disharmonies are diminishing,
then we can confidently wish it a long life. If, on the other hand, we
discover that in the course of time the various parts of the capitalist
machine have come to clash with one another more and more violently, if we
discern that the flaws in the structure are becoming positive chasms, then
it is time to say, 'Rest in peace'.

We have now, therefore, to study the evolution of capitalism.

Notes

1)
We are now speaking of a change of price without reference to money,
without reference to the question whether there be much money or little,
or whether the currency be gold or paper: Changes in price due to changes
in the standard of value may be very large, but such changes affect all
commodities simultaneously, and this does not explain the differences in
price as between one commodity and another. For example, the great
extension of paper currency has enormously inflated prices in all
countries. But this universal dearness does not explain why one commodity
should be dearer than another.